While I—the reason for all of this—was safe at home. In my small, ordinary apartment, with the pale, gray light of pre-dawn seeping through the windows and a handful of birds chirping outside.
This waswrong.
The golden circle was smaller than a basketball now, and it was shrinking fast. Once again I reached inside myself, trying to grasp whatever power I’d used to create the bridge in the first place, but it just slipped through my fingers. Desperate, I did the only other thing I could think of—I tried to grab the portal and hold it open manually.
My fingers tingled as they moved through the golden light. The portal wasalmosttangible. In some places I could feel nothing at all, but in others it felt like trying to grip water. Or melted gelatin.
But I couldn’t hold it open. I pushed my right hand further in, feeling for anything I might be able to grasp, but the light still shrank around me.
And then, with a sickening suddenness, it squeezed down on my hand.
I yanked my arm immediately, but the portal tried to keep it, the golden light suctioning to my skin like a vacuum.
Oh god, I’m going to lose my hand.Nausea hit me as the light collapsed in on itself, squeezing my hand so tight it felt like my bones were breaking. I screamed, continuing to yank back with all my strength, cursing myself for being so stupid.
And then, with a softpop!it abruptly released me.
I fell back, cradling my throbbing hand against me. Despite the pain, nothing looked broken, but when I thought of what had almost happened…
Another wave of nausea hit me, and I stumbled into the bathroom—reaching the toilet just in time to throw up bile.
With a groan, I sank down onto the laminate tiles. I had nothing left in me. I was drained in every sense of the word, and I wanted nothing more than to curl up on the floor and sob myself to sleep.
This is wrong, I kept thinking. No matter how many times I tried to tell myself that I’d done the right thing by coming home, that this was what was best for the brothers and for Therador, I couldn’t make myself believe it. This didn’t feel like helping them—this felt like running away.
Nausea hit me again, and I curled over the toilet, even though there was nothing left to throw up.
This is wrong.
I shouldn’t have left them. Shouldn’t have let Octavian push me through the portal. I could havehelpedthem. It would have taken a few minutes to build up enough essence to do anything, but without the restriction of the pearls I could have blasted all of those vulgen away at once, or possibly even taken on a member of the Circle if I’d had the chance.
Don’t be an idiot, said the voice of reason in the back of my mind.If you’d tried to use essence back there, there was a good chance you would have hurt one of the brothers in the process. You still have no idea how to actuallyuseyour power. You were just in the way. At least now you’re not a burden or a distraction to them anymore.
Logic, unfortunately, offered little consolation. I lowered myself onto the floor completely, my cheek cradled on the scruffy bathmat.
I must have passed out after that, because the next thing I knew I was jolted awake by a knock at my apartment door.
Now? Really?I never had visitors. Why were people suddenly showing up at my door when I felt like crap and was deep in a cycle of self-flagellation?
Probably just a lost delivery guy or something, I thought, rubbing the side of my face. I had few close friends around here—at least none who’d feel comfortable enough to show up at my door with zero notice—and I’d barely said two words to any of my neighbors since I’d moved into the building. This felt like exactly the sort of situation where I was completely justified in pretending I wasn’t home.
Decision made, I laid my head back down. When the nausea and pain passed, I’d figure out what to do next. But until then, I was just going to close my eyes and breathe.
The knock sounded again. Louder this time.
If I’d had more energy, I would have yelled at them to go away. But it wasn’t worth the effort.
The longer I lay there, just breathing, the more the pain retreated to tolerable levels. My crushed hand still throbbed every now and then, but I had every reason to believe that, beyond a handful of bruises, I’d escaped serious injury. My nausea was fading, too, and the pounding in my head was settling down into more of a dull ache.
But as my bodily discomfort faded, I was left with nothing to distract me from my guilt. I’d agreed to come home to keep more people from being hurt on my behalf, and instead the opposite had happened. If I hadn’t been souselessand taken so long to create the bridge, the brothers might have had a chance. And I wouldn’t have been left feeling like all of this had been in vain.
Another knock. This one so loud it echoed through my still-sensitive skull.
“Come on, Goldie!” shouted a familiar female voice. “Open up!”
My eyes flew open. Iknewthat voice, but I couldn’t quite place it.
She wasn’t done. “If you don’t open up in the next twenty seconds we’re busting down the door! Don’t think we won’t do it!”
